Throwing my hat in as a fan of Terry Funk

I know I’m a little late to the match, but I want to throw my hat into the pro wrestling ring as a big fan of Terry Funk. The wrestler from Amarillo passed away late last month at the age of 79.

If you’re going to be a fan of a sport you have to have a hero. For a time I was a fan of “Big Time Wrestling” and in particular the Western States Sports promoters out of Amarillo, which Terry’s family owned. Along with his father Dory Funk Sr. and Dory Jr. the trio represented the good guys in wrestling in the late 1960s.

My little brother and I stopped whatever we were doing for an hour every Saturday to lay on the floor in front of the television and watch wrestling. When it was over we wrestled 10 rounds or until something got broken or one of us was bleeding on the rug and my mother would throw us both out of the ring.

There was a rumor that those Saturday afternoon bouts were all fake, that the blood was fake and the haymakers and body slams were staged. After all, the spinning toe hold worked great on my brother, but did kinda look like they weren’t really twisting the guy's leg on TV.

I finally decided it was fake and dropped my belief in wrestling and the Easter Bunny, but I hung on to old Santa Claus.

During the 1970s I liked watching boxing and I loved watching Muhammad Ali fight. But I’ve got to say my favorite was Sugar Ray Leonard.

Eventually the sport of boxing slowly began to fade along with Ali’s memory. Soon what was left wasn’t much better than wrestling, which was beginning to promote WrestleMania. Both sports soon became relegated to pay-per-view cable — too rich for my blood and all promotion and not much sport.

The last few decades a new combat sport came along and it was obviously not fake, but it was violent. I just couldn’t bring myself to watch it, even when my brother and dear old mother began to talk about MMA (Mixed Martial Arts).

I got hooked to some degree, when Rowdy Ronda Rousey got decked by a high kick to the neck by “The Preacher’s Daughter” Holly Holm of Albuquerque. Rousey started out as one of the “good” fighters in the Octagon but developed a bit of a reputation before Holm knocked her out.

I follow Holly Holm on social media. One day one of my best friends casually told me he had met her and had a few long conversations about cars and building with her. He said she was pretty nice.

Lately I’ve taken to watching MMA on YouTube at night and I might be getting hooked. I like the women’s fights better — not quite as bloody and more sporting passion.

Holly Holm is up in her 40s now and defying age and health by training hard. Terry Funk stayed in the ring up into his 60s. Even heroes eventually fade away.

Karl Terry writes for Clovis Media Inc. Contact him at:

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